mode 2

Mode 2 is a theory of knowledge production, put forth in 1994 by Michael Gibbons, Camille Limoges, Helga Nowotny, Simon Schwartzman, Peter Scott and Martin Trow in their book The new production of knowledge: the dynamics of science and research in contemporary societies(Sage). Gibbons and colleagues argued that a new form of knowledge production started emerging from the mid 20th century which is context-driven, problem-focused and interdisciplinary. It involves multidisciplinary teams brought together for short periods of time to work on specific problems in the real world. Gibbons and his colleagues labelled this ‘mode 2’ knowledge production. This he and his colleagues distinguished from traditional research, which they labelled ‘mode 1', which is academic, investigator-initiated and discipline-based knowledge production. So mode 1 knowledge production is investigator-initiated and discipline-based while mode 2 is problem-focused and interdisciplinary. Or as Limoges (1996:14-15) wrote -
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